Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput – Computer-to-computer session/connection establishing – Network resources access controlling
Patent
1998-05-29
2000-07-11
Lim, Krisna
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput
Computer-to-computer session/connection establishing
Network resources access controlling
709227, 709232, 709226, G06F 1516, G06F 15173
Patent
active
06088732&
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The present invention relates to the control of transfer of data between remote locations and a method of controlling the distributed processing of data.
With the increasing use of networked information systems which provide distributed applications, there is a problem of lack of homogeneity of the local resources for implementation of the distributed application. For example, distributed applications can operate over networks such as the Internet, Wide Area Networks (WANs) and Local Area Networks. (LANs). The computers which are connected over such networks can have different capabilities and the capabilities of the local machines or terminals must be taken into consideration when setting up a distributed application which is to be implemented over the network. Also, the capabilities of the network to support the distributed application must also be taken into consideration.
Work has been undertaken with regard to establishing guaranteed quality of service in the network part of a distributed application e.g. the resource reservation protocol (RSVP) in the Internet and Q.2931 in an Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM). However, in a network of heterogenous terminals the capability of the terminals must be taken into account in order to guarantee that the distributed application will operate satisfactorily. In many of the existing distributed applications, a person wishing to set up a distributed application such as video conferencing must take into consideration the resources available at the terminals when setting up the application.
The problem of negotiating a quality of service for a multimedia application operative over a network of heterogenous terminals has been considered in an article entitled "On QoS Negotiation in Distributed Multimedia Applications" by A. Vogel et al, Department IRO, University of Montreal, 1993 [Voge 93d], Department Publication #891. In this paper a multimedia object is defined as comprising one of a plurality of media types e.g. audio, video, text, images, audio and video, and the media types comprise a set of parameters defining properties of the multimedia object. Capabilities of the operating system at the terminals are defined in terms of the media type supported and hardware parameters. Thus, in order to determine the quality of service for the multimedia application, negotiation takes place by comparing the media type parameters with the media type and hardware parameters. Quality of service can then be determined accordingly.
The problem with the approach taken by Vogel et al is that by using the media types as parameters to negotiate the quality of service, no account is taken in the negotiation of the workload of the terminals. For example, although a terminal may be capable of supporting a multimedia application utilising video of MPEG2 format, when no other applications are running on the terminal, as soon as other applications are run and consume resources at the terminal, the terminal is no longer able to support the service with video in MPEG2 format.
In accordance with a first aspect the present invention provides control apparatus for controlling the transfer of information to a remote apparatus, the control apparatus comprising: apparatus to process the information; remote apparatus which is to receive the information; currently available at the remote apparatus; and apparatus in accordance with the result of the comparison.
This aspect of the present invention also provides a method of controlling the transfer of information to a remote apparatus, the method comprising: apparatus to process the information; remote apparatus which is to receive the information; currently available at the remote apparatus; and apparatus in accordance with the result of the comparison step.
This aspect of the present invention thus enables the requirements of the information which are required in order for the information to be used at a remote apparatus to be compared with the resources currently available for processing the information at each remote apparatus. The transfer of
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Grace Andrew P
Smith Alan P
British Telecommunications public limited company
Lim Krisna
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